The last week of deployment

So here we are. There’s only one week left of this long, oh so long, six month deployment. I can barely believe it! Next Monday will be like Christmas Eve, five days before actual Christmas Eve.

Words cannot describe how desperate I am for that first hug. I don’t think I’ll let him go! It feels like a lifetime ago that we were sitting in RAF Brize Norton waving him off, but at the same time I remember it vividly, as if it was yesterday.

So much has changed in these six months. Little I is a different child. I looked back on some videos of before R deployed and she still seems like a baby – albeit a walking and attempting to talk baby! She’s now a fully fledged little girl. Even her hair is double the length! Her speech has come on leaps and bounds and her likes and dislikes have changed.

R will probably take a bit of time to adjust to his new, even more independent, little daughter. I’m sure he will be really excited to learn all about her new routines and abilities, but at the same time it’ll probably be really hard to see how much he’s missed out on her development.

It’ll be even harder with regards to Baby L! R left when L was ten days old and before all hell broke loose with his silent reflux (separate post on that coming soon). I’ve had to warn him on a few occasions that he’s not coming back to an easy baby. Little I was a dream compared to poor L and I’ve made it really clear to R not to expect things to be like what they were like when Little I was a newborn. He’ll find it really difficult (as I do) to see L in pain and not be able to do anything about it.

We’ll get there though and we’ll adjust back into a new routine when we’re back in our house down South. I have quite a few fun things planned before then though so celebrate him being back.

We’re off to Edinburgh for a night before Christmas, staying in an Airbnb. Edinburgh is beautiful at Christmas and we’ll have lots of fun exploring. I find saying in Airbnbs easier than hotels when travelling with kids, and this one is super central. Wonderful stuff.

Then there’s Christmas and New Year! Eek, how fast has that come around?

R turns 30 at the beginning of January so we’ll have a celebration up here and then we will be off down to see his family for some more surprise celebrations, I’m sure.

I’ve shocked myself with how strong I’ve managed to be through this deployment (apologies, tooting my own horn – toot toot haha). There have been so many ups and downs but it really does show you how strong you can be when you need to be – *sings* ‘all the women who independent…’.

With R coming home, it’s really making me think about all the families who don’t have their loved ones with them this Christmas. My heart goes out to them and I hope that they still have a great Christmas and get some form of contact on Christmas Day. It will no doubt be us in the next few years.

Six months done. This will be the best Christmas ever. I can’t bloody wait!

We won’t think about the next saga in our military family life until it all gets confirmed……

Merry week before Christmas everyone! Thank you so very, very much for all your ongoing support. I’ve been blown away by all the support on all our social channels and YouTube so thank you, from the bottom of my heart x